


Until It Cracks

by ShyAudacity



Series: reminiscent of a perfect mess [3]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, American Sign Language, Angst with a Happy Ending, Archie Andrews is a Good Friend, Aromantic Asexual Jughead Jones, Bad Parent FP Jones II, Beronica is a subplot, Blood and Injury, Child Abuse, Gen, Good Parent Fred Andrews, Hard of Hearing Jughead Jones, He tries to be at least, Hurt Jughead Jones, Hurt/Comfort, Jughead Jones-centric, Mentioned Gladys Jones, Pissed Jughead, Touch Averse Jughead Jones, basically yeah
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-27
Updated: 2018-11-27
Packaged: 2019-09-01 04:16:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16757764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShyAudacity/pseuds/ShyAudacity
Summary: Jughead decides somewhere around twelve years old that if this is what love looks like then no thanks. He likes it best when everyone leaves him alone. He doesn’t trust anyone except Archie- maybe Fred, but that’s it. Everyone else is going to hurt him if given the chance, or so it seems that way.He listens to the way that Archie talks about his various crushes and doesn’t see much of the appeal- why would you give someone the option to hurt you by letting them into your life?ORThe one about Jughead. Before and after losing his hearing. (Warnings in tags).





	Until It Cracks

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wingedbears](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wingedbears/gifts).



> This is definitely going to make more sense if you've read the previous fic(s), but you don't necessarily have to.
> 
> I wasn't totally sure that I'd be able to write this fic, but here I am! This is for my beta Erin because she's fantastic and loves Hard of Hearing Jughead (sorry I didn't have you beta this, I wanted it to be a surprise even though I told you about it the other day lol).
> 
> Unbeta'd and title from Backpedal by Olivia Gatwood.

Jughead Jones is eight years old the first time that his father lays a hand on him.

He dropped a glass in the kitchen and FP pushed him to his knees, made him clean it up with his bare hands. Jughead didn’t dare cry, thought that it would only upset his father more.

When Archie asks at school the next day, Jughead doesn’t say anything about the cuts on his fingers, doesn’t want to get in more trouble- what if Archie tells his dad? There’s no way that would end well.

When he’s ten, he and Archie accidentally leave a dent in the wall in the shape of Archie’s elbow while they’re playing catch in the living room, and Fred doesn’t get mad or yell or anything, just says they can help fix it and learn to be careful more next time.

“Why didn’t he yell?” Jughead whispers in Archie’s ear after Fred has walked away.

Archie looks at him funny, “Dad never yells, unless baseball is on, then sometimes- does yours?”

Feeling embarrassed, Jughead doesn’t answer. This is the first time that he realizes that his Dad is different from everyone else’s Dad and doesn’t like the how he feels about it. Feels bad for wishing that things were different, that his Dad was different.

Jughead doesn’t tell anyone when things start to get bad, like really bad. He’s learned to associate being the center of attention with being in trouble and no matter how hard he tries not to it just keeps happening. He can’t seem to do anything right; his dad likes to remind him of that.

For weeks, Jughead swears up and down to having fallen down the stairs as an excuse for the broken arm, tells his teacher the same thing when she won't stop asking him about it.

“Mrs. Reza, I swear, I tripped going downstairs, I fall on my face all the time- can I have my math test back now?”

That year, his family loses their house a week short of his birthday and they move into the trailer park a few blocks away, tells himself that maybe things will get better because of this, even though he knows they won’t.

They never do.

Jughead decides somewhere around twelve years old that if this is what love looks like then _no thanks._ He likes it best when everyone leaves him alone. He doesn’t trust anyone except Archie- maybe Fred, but that’s it. Everyone else is going to hurt him if given the chance, or so it seems that way.

He listens to the way that Archie talks about his various crushes and doesn’t see much of the appeal- why would you give someone the option to hurt you by letting them into your life?

Middle school begins and Veronica Lodge starts sitting with them at lunch because she’s Archie _other_ best friend, and Jughead just goes with it, tries to not feel like a charity case when she offers him the parts of her lunch that she doesn’t want. So long as she keeps her distance- so long as she doesn’t put her hands on him- then Jughead doesn’t care what Veronica does.

_At least she’s nice,_ he tells himself, _at least she’s just trying to help._

Dad starts drinking again- or maybe he never really stopped- and Jughead learns to walk on eggshells any time that he’s home. Calculates every move that he makes, everything he says, god forbid he do the wrong thing and catch a fist to the face.

FP gets Jughead with his wedding ring one night, right below his eye, sharp and stinging, splitting him open. In the morning at school, when Archie asks about it, Jughead’s automatic response is:

“Jellybean scratched me in the face, she’s a lot tougher than she looks.” 

Mom takes off with Jellybean a few days later and doesn’t ask Jughead if he wants to come with, just leaves him alone with his dad. He wants to hate her for it, but he can’t, not really.

He’d leave if given the option, too.

Archie knows. He has to, right? He’s Jughead’s best friend- his only friend, even, why wouldn’t he know about how his Dad hurts him. But… if he knows, why wouldn’t he say anything?

When they're sophomores, Jughead has to cancel his birthday movie plans with Archie at the last minute because he can’t even breathe without feeling like his ribs are going to concave- he never liked his birthday too much, anyway. Archie asks him about the injury come Monday morning when Jughead can only sit upright, stiff as a board during their history class.

“How the hell did you manage to do that?”

He gets a flashing, painful memory of FP trying to force the toe of his boot between his ribs and Jughead realizes that maybe Archie doesn’t know after all, maybe he’s just as blind to this as everyone else.

Jughead puts that idea out of his mind, tells himself he’s wrong, trying to not feel discouraged. Archie has to know; what kind of best friend would ignore something like this?

“I slipped in the shower the other night,” he lies, tone flat, “It’s just a bruise, Archie, I’ll be fine in a few days.”

He wishes so desperately for that last part to be true.

It’s Valentine's day and FP seemingly has a vendetta against anything that dares bother him, even his own son.

Jughead doesn’t have to ask to know that he’s been drinking all day at this point, so he makes an excuse to leave, tells him that he has plans with Archie at Pop’s and doesn’t even make it to the door before FP has a retort.

“’Course you do,” he slurs from the living room- FP stumbles as he gets to his feet, “N’ver home anymore. What? Is your old man not good ‘nuff for you now, huh?”

“I’m not gonna have this fight with you, Dad.” He turns on his heel, moving to pull his maroon jacket off the back of the kitchen chair. Before he knows what happening, Jughead feels his father’s hands slamming into his back, pushing him to the floor. 

Jughead groans as he hits the floor, breath leaving him. He barely gets it back when the sharp, all too familiar feeling of his father’s shoe piercing his side comes. FP gets him once, twice, then stops, taking a step back from his son.

Jughead groans quietly and stays on the ground, still trying to breathe through the pain- it radiates like a firecracker, spiking every time he releases. He tries pushing himself up on his hands- doesn’t even get that far before something hard and sharp is smashing into the back of his head, shattering as it does, keeping him on the ground.

He smells the beer before the pain kicks in, the sour smell flooding his nose; it reminds him of the time he’d “fallen” down the stairs, how foggy he’d felt afterward, head swimming too much to move.

Somewhere above him, Jughead hears his father spit in his direction, then the trailer door swings open and close, leaving him all alone, bleeding and helpless- unsurprising.

His eyes are closed but he’s still seeing stars; Jughead just lays there, facedown and glass still digging into his skin, head to heavy and hurting to pick himself up. Somethings wrong, something must be broken. His ears are actually ringing- wait, no, that’s his ringtone. Shit, where’s his phone-.

Jughead forces his eyes open, feels like he’d tried opening his eyes under water. His phone is within reach of his hand, thank god. Jughead has to try three times before he can actually get the call to accept, his brain and his body all delayed-

The way all the sounds keep cutting in and out terrify him.

It’s Archie. He can hardly make out what Archie’s saying but Jughead knows that he at least says _help_ and _please_ before the phone falls out of his hand, just prays that somebody comes.

Ten minutes later- all of them spent wishing he’d just _pass out_ already- Archie and Fred are bursting into his house and rolling him over, Archie gasping and Fred leaving to call an ambulance.

_It must be worse than I thought._

Things start to get fuzzy again after that, but Jughead can still make out Archie’s panicked face, can feel his hand somewhere near his shoulder, the other one holding the back of his head, trying to keep the blood inside him. Jughead would push him off if he thought he could get his arms to work the way they’re supposed to.

“It’s okay, Jughead,” Archie rambles, “You’re gonna be okay.”

Jughead knows it’s not, but he’s too far gone to tell him that.

Jughead wakes up later with the muted feelings of a headache and a dry throat. It hurts when he forces his eyes open but that’s not important cause someone is talking above him and _can’t he understand_ any of it.

_What. The fuck._

It only takes two seconds for the panic to kick in at full force, the tight pain in his chest even more present than it was before. Jughead’s vision begins to swim as he stares up at the ceiling, everything going foggy. His discomfort must catch the attention of whoever else is in the room because there are hands on him in less than a second, holding him down. Someone that sounds a lot like Fred Andrews tries talking to him.

“Easy, _easy_ , Jug, you’re okay.”

_But it’s not,_ he wants to say. Nothing sounds right and someone is touching him and he wants it to _stop._ The hand leaves and Jughead finally blinks away the fog, looking up at the scene in front of him.

Archie, Fred, and a black woman wearing a doctor’s badge are all there, the woman saying something he can’t comprehend. They’re all standing at the foot of his bed, faces full of concern, talking to him, at least he thinks they are- everything sounds like they’re trying to speak to him through a steel door.

“Wh- why does it sound like that? Why can’t I hear you?” Even his own voice sounds like someone is trying to yell through a window, makes his blood run cold all over again.

The doctor- Dr. Wilcox, he notices- writes on her clipboard before handing it to him. it reads: _There was glass embedded in your skull and you have a concussion, it’s likely that your hearing has been affected. There’s no telling when it will come back. I’m sorry, son._

His lip trembles, mostly out of fear and anger; he recoils when Fred tries to lay a hand on his shoulder. Jughead yells at all of them to leave- or at least tries to, then cries more than he has in years, curled on his side as much as his ribs will let him.

He resents Archie and his dad and everyone for not doing anything earlier, for not stopping his dad when they had the chance, before he got hurt in an irreversible way. Jughead can already see the headlines, the way the papers will paint him as helpless and make the Andrews look like his knights in shining armor.

There’s no glory in being the savior when all you did was show up.

More than anything, Jughead hates how he knows this town- _the rest of the world_ \- will react to him now, like he needs to pitied, like it’s such a shame that no one thought to look after him in the first place.

FP gets arrested, no surprise there. Jughead’s hearing only gets worse as the healing kicks in and he moves in with the Andrews. He hates that there isn’t another option, hates his mom for leaving him alone with his Dad, for letting this happen to him. Jughead can hardly look at Archie or Fred without getting mad.

_They knew. They knew and they didn’t do anything._

_Archie could have stopped all this from happening. Why does he get to be the hero?_

A week or so after he comes to live with them, Fred slides a book across the kitchen island right before dinner, a guide to American Sign Language. After Fred has walked away, Jughead grumbles at it, but opens it up nonetheless, begins to teach his hands everything his ears can’t understand.

Jughead ignores Archie as much as he can while still living together, refuses to talk to anyone unless absolutely necessary. He makes sure to let everyone know how pissed he is at the rest of the world and spends the rest of the school year with his head down as much as possible.

Right before school ends, Kevin Keller gets caught- by Reggie Mantle nonetheless- sticking a love letter into some football players locker, and gets exiled by nearly everyone at school. When Kevin walks up to his table at lunch, tears in his eyes and defeated, Jughead lets Kevin sit with him without question.

It’s not easy to come back from hurting when your whole life has been put on display and made a mockery of by the rest of the world. He knows that, has a feeling that Kevin does, too. They don’t talk at all- and that’s fine with Jughead. He wouldn’t know what to say even if he wanted too.

Jughead won’t let anyone within two feet of him if he can help it. If he didn’t hate being touched before, he certainly does now; Jughead nearly hit the ceiling the first time Fred squeezed his shoulder as he was walking past. Both of the Andrews men make a point not to touch him now, give him all the space he wants, they haven’t been able to find any other way to help.

Jughead spends the summer in the movie theater, re-watching the same movies over and over again, trying to learn the shape of sounds coming from another person’s mouth. He declines every time Archie asks if he wants to go to Pop’s with Veronica and Reggie, but doesn’t get mad when Veronica brings back a milkshake and a small wink.

She’s better than he gives her credit for.

Betty Cooper moves to town at the beginning of junior year and is dead set on inserting herself in Jughead’s life.

He hates it.

During lunch, she follows him down the hall and all the way into the school’s newspaper room before he finally caves. It’s the first time he’s spoken up in two days and he only does it in hopes that it’ll make her leave him alone already.

“Why do you care so much? Why do I have to be your new project? Isn’t there someone else at this school that you could latch onto?”

Betty looks like she’s going to swallow her own tongue, and for a moment Jughead regrets snapping at her. At least she knows how to sign, he’ll give her that much.

“You remind me of my brother… He spent a lot of time alone and never wanted to talk to anybody and- …he started spiraling before anybody could stop it. I don’t want that to happen to anyone else. Does that make sense?” 

Jughead makes a contemplative face, halfway ready to respond when Veronica and Archie walk in, having apparently followed them here. Not wanting to be around anyone else, or a part of this conversation anymore, Jughead takes this as his opportunity to leave, turning on his heel and not looking back even once. 

Even after that, Betty keeps sitting with him at lunch but doesn’t try to make him talk, just wants to keep him company, so he lets it slide. It’s nice to have someone other than just Kevin to sit with for a change, figures having a new sort of friend wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.

The school year keeps going and midterms creep up on everybody before they know it. A few days before Halloween, Jughead is at his locker when Reggie appears behind him, shoving at his shoulders and saying things that he wouldn’t care to hear even if he could. He doesn’t have to look around to know that a crowd is growing.

“C’mon, Jones. Didn’t that old man of yours ever teach you how to fight back?”

He turns to leave, fully intending ignoring him when Archie appears out of nowhere, getting in Reggie’s face, pushing him back and giving him his two cents.

_Oh, great. Now he decides to be the good guy._

Archie turns around after a minute, looking as though he’s expecting _gratitude_ of all things, and Jughead seethes. He starts walking away as soon as Archie meets his eye; Jughead doesn’t want to be here anymore, especially not with him.

Archie only adds fuel to the fire when he grabs Jughead’s shoulder, spurring a reaction out of him. 

“Stop!” Jughead yells; lord only knows what he sounds like right now. “I didn’t ask for your help. I don’t need you to fight my battles for me!”

“How the hell am I supposed to know that if you won’t talk to me! You won’t let me help.”

“Oh right, I’m sorry, because you were such _a big help_ when my dad did a number on the back of my head six months ago. Insisting that I move into your house, all the pitied looks from your dad, what more could I have asked for? You couldn’t be bothered play hero before all this shit happened and I certainly don’t need you to do it now so would you just _fuck off_?”

His chest heaves as he finishes, rage coming out of him in a way that it hasn’t before, hates the way that it makes him feel. Jughead thinks of his father for a moment, wonders if this is how FP felt after every time he unleashed his fury onto one of his children.

Archie blanches, looking like he doesn’t know what to say, like he _really didn’t have a clue_ that Jughead’s dad had been abusing him for years. 

The sight of him- the realization of everything makes his stomach twist into a knot, so Jughead walks away from him. He ignores the stares he gets and walks in the opposite direction of his psych class, ditches to sit in the music room and not have to worry about whether or not people are staring at him- they always are, but still. It gives him time to panic without being on display for the whole school to see. 

Betty comes in at some point, joining him on the piano bench; it must be lunchtime.

“It’s not that I can’t hear at all, or anything like that,” he says, eventually, solemn. “It’s just that nothing sounds right. Like when you stick your head underwater and try to talk, most of it doesn’t make sense. The sound isn’t clear.” 

“That must be really frustrating,” she says, signing along.

Jughead nods despite having not looked up for more than a second.

“What you said about your Dad earlier… is that true?”

He realizes then that Betty must have been there for the fight, that she heard everything he said, but also realizes that she never asked about the accident until now. Jughead makes a mental note to thank her for it later, for not striking up a conversation just for the sake of getting the unfortunate truth out of him.

Jughead nods again, _we got into a fight and he hit me over the back of the head with a beer bottle; twenty-eight stitches and one concussion later all I got was a new roommate and a pair of ears that don’t work._

Betty makes a comment about being treated better than that, and he ignores it, would laugh if he didn’t think she was being sincere. The next thing he knows, she’s trying to kiss him on the cheek and Jughead gets mad all over again, storming out of the room before she can give her reasoning.

When is the rest of the world going to realize that he wants to be left alone?

Jughead skips school the next day, relieved when Fred lets him- he must have heard about the fight somehow. He spends the majority of it in his room sitting at his computer, just wasting time. He’d go to Pop’s and get a burger, but he’d rather not have some rando asking him why he’s there in the middle of the day, or have to worry whether or not the waitress will get his order correct.

By the time Friday rolls around, Jughead still hasn’t said a word to Archie about the whole thing, but it looks like they’re going to have to now. Archie had come in and tapped on Jughead’s shoulder, an apologetic look on his face as he sat down in front of him.

“Why didn’t you tell me that your dad was hurting you?”

Jughead shrugs, “I don’t know. You were around long enough, I just figured you knew. Thought maybe you were too afraid to say something, that we’d get in trouble somehow.”

That’s what he told himself all these years, it was the only thing that made sense, until now.

“Is that why you’ve been pushing me away?” Archie asks, “Cause you thought I knew?”

“Yeah… I was mad. Nobody did anything before the bad thing happened so- I don’t know. I guess it just felt like you were doing all this to make up for the fact that no one did anything until after I got hurt. Like your way of apologizing was insisting that I move into your house or something.”

“We would have let you move in, regardless. You know that, right, Jug? If I’d known-.”

“I know,” Jughead interrupts, his face falling a little. “I know you would have… I’m sorry for doubting you, and for pushing you away. That’s not fair.”

Archie just shrugs. “I’m sorry that your dad is a jackass.”

He laughs, sharp and quick; it feels good to do that again, laugh with Archie. He can’t remember the last time they did something like that, certainly not anytime recently.

“Yeah,” Jughead replies, “You got me there.”

Veronica gives Jughead hearing aids for Christmas and for a minute he doesn’t know what to do with himself. After he’s put them on, it’s like his ears just popped for the first time in ten months; he’s buzzing with nervous energy. Jughead looks up at Archie, signing: _say something._

“Juggie? Can you hear me?”

Jughead’s eyes wrinkle at the edges and it takes everything in him not to cry in front of everyone right then and there, mouth stretching wide. He makes a sound similar to a laugh, says, “It’s deeper than I remembered.”

He’s never been so grateful for Veronica’s existence as he is right then.

After that, she spends the next four months reminding Jughead of his father in the way that she looks constantly lost, like she wants to be somewhere else, somewhere far away from Riverdale. She’s intoxicated in one way or another each time he sees her and it makes his skin crawl every time, old trauma coming back to haunt him.

A weird part of him wants to ask her about it, see if she’s okay, but Jughead wouldn’t know what to say to her. That same part of him is also afraid of getting screamed at by a sad, angry drunk again, so he leaves it alone.

Out of seemingly nowhere, she disappears for three months, and Jughead watches Archie panic about it nearly every day that Veronica’s gone.

“Maybe she’s getting help, Arch,” he told him once, trying to settle him, “This could be a good thing.”

Turns out he was wrong, more wrong than he could have imagined.

Veronica comes back looking worse than she did before she left, and a part of him wants to hug her, wants to take the hurt away from her face and make sure it never comes back. He doesn’t, though, sees the way that her new instinct is to retract from every hand that reaches for her, even Betty.

It’s all familiar in such a sick way.

Jughead realizes then that they’re not as different as he used to think they were, they’re both just a couple of kids with a couple of shitty parents that did not know how to love them the right way.

He lends her his thick flannels when Veronica mentions being cold, and she smiles at him. It’s not the same as all the other smiles she used to give him, but the feeling is still there; she’s still Ronnie, all the same.

Right before senior year starts, Veronica asks him something that makes his head spin.

“How do you deal with it? How do you get over being hurt by someone who was supposed to love you?”

It’s not until right then that Jughead realizes he doesn’t have an answer. He hadn’t thought about it until now.

“I don’t know…” he tells her, honestly. “I haven’t really figured that out yet.”

Maybe that’s a good thing, though. Jughead can’t even remember the last time that he thought about his dad, tries to avoid doing so as much as possible. His mom and sister call sometimes- but there’s too much distance at this point, they’re hardly his family anymore.

He thinks about the life that he has here with his friends- both new and old- the people that have stuck by him through everything, even when he didn’t want them to. Jughead gets a fond feeling in his chest, grateful for all the things they’ve done for him over the years. He doesn’t doubt that he wouldn’t be standing here now if it weren’t for all of them.

These people, this small, chaotic group right here is his life, this is the family he deserves. What a relief it is to say he’s finally found them.

**Author's Note:**

> That title might have to change but we'll see. 
> 
> Thanks for reading! Comments/Kudos are encouraged and appreciated. I'm on tumblr as archieandrewsprotectionsquad. Thanks again for reading, have a great day!


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